A Hamburger Today

Note: First Looks give previews of new drinks and menus we're curious about. Since they are arranged photo shoots and interviews with bars and restaurants, we do not make critical evaluations or recommendations.

About this time a year ago, the Union Square Hospitality folks started developing a new cold-pressed juice line. Chef Michael Romano, the senior partner for Danny Meyer's hospitality group, worked with a nutritionist to create all of the juice blends, which are now available at two New York-area Equinox gyms (one in Midtown, the other on the Upper West Side), with plans to multiply locations in the near future.

There are seven juices ($7.95-9.95), all of them organic and more interesting than you might expect. When's the last time you drank some kohlrabi or shiso leaf or jicama? You can tell that a chef was behind these blends.

There are two green juices, one more of a green-green, savory and salad-like juice (with kale, kohlrabi, spinach, swiss chard), and the other a bit sweeter (with avocado, kiwi, pear, and more). Of the two red juices, there's a beet-based one and another made with red cabbage juice instead that's blended with cranberries, figs, bosc pear, ginger, and juniper berries.

You need not actually be an Equinox member to buy the juices, which are made fresh daily at the USHG corporate kitchen. Just stroll in and bonus, you get to hear the gym music thumping through the walls. Creative Juice has also developed a few cleanse options: $55 for a day's worth of five juices and a sixth complement: either a salad, smoothie, or soup (packaged in a juice bottle, too).

We also tried a few of the smoothies ($5.75-6.50), including "Go Man Go," a mango and ginger smoothie thickened with oatmeal.